Faves of 2017

What an awesome reading year 2017 was!  I mostly read whatever book I felt like according to my whim, as well as making an effort to read from my long term TBR list. I also read some YA that my teenage kids (aged 13, 15 and 16) were loving so we could have bookish chats and share faves.

I've read some books that received a lot of high praise and awards, but my personal faves still tend to be the cruisey, charming books that make me smile, swoon and relax. It's these books that continue to be my fave reading experiences, the ones that are feel good reads, where I just chill out and escape.

I have pie charts and stats regarding everything I read in 2017: genres and audience, format and star ratings, author nationalities, years published and series verse standalone in this blog post. 

In summary I read 135 books

Adult Fiction: 58

Young Adult: 63

Middle Grade: 7

New Adult: 4

This included

40 Audiobooks

15 rereads

I rated over 60 of my books 4 stars or higher (which means I either really liked, or loved, 60 books this year!) This has made it hard to pick my stand-out reads, and many I picked are maybe not the best, most brilliantly written books I read, but are my personal favourites just because they matched my mood and brought me light, happiness and unputdownable goodness. 

Fave Contemporary YA

A List of Cages by Robin Roe
A List of Cages was heartcrushingly good. If I were to make a word cloud of this book, included would be: hopeful, tense, devastating, brotherhood, secrets, cute, tears, powerful, smiley. 

Letters to the Lost by Brigid Kemmerer

This was a heart-in-mouth, unputdownable read. It also features one of my personal kryptonite fave tropes: letter writing with secret identity.

Stargazing for Beginners by Jenny McLachlan

So funny and sweet with a slow burn, feel good crush. I loved the humour and so many hilarious scenes. It's a little bit quirky/over the top in some places (with some of the characters, climax and resolution) but I liked it in this book - I like off-beat humour with a lot of heart. 

Bone Gap by Laura Ruby

A mesmerising blend of gorgeous writing and mysterious happenings, this contemporary/fantasy/magical realism/genre-blending novel completely stole my heart. I was hooked after a few chapters but I did not anticipate how much the characters would endear themselves to me. Laura Ruby is a born storyteller and some parts had me feeling like I was inside a fairy tale. This book not only had achey, brilliant, shining characters to fall in love with, but it was also unpredictable and daring and wholly original while remaining full of heart.

By Your Side by Kasie West

They hit that sweet YA spot (something light, swoony and unputdownable ~ with just the right amount of character development to add some ache and depth)

Orphan Train by Kristina Baker Klein

This started out slow and then I was suddenly hooked. I loved the history in this and the bittersweet discoveries which gave me actual tears right near the end. This was compulsively readable and a story I know will stay with me. 

Fave Middle Grade

Well That Was Awkward by Rachel Vail

Absolutely hilarious, cute and swoony. I grinned my way through this and often reread scenes just to let the smiley moments linger. I loved everything about this <3 True to the title, there were many hilariously awkward moments, so this should be your next read when you're in the mood for some LOLs (haha). I seriously loved this ~ it's a perfect blend of some of my fave things in fiction: light-hearted fun with the perfect amount of angst, awkward shenanigans, characters who are my people, and a plot which builds in anticipation to a sweet. sweet climax and charming and cool resolution.

The Extremely Inconvenient Adventures of Bronte Mettlestone by Jaclyn Moriarty

Ahh, perfectly charming, whimsical, funny and wholly original with some wicked and wild unexpected twists. This book was such a delight to spend time with and so creatively realised. The characters endeared themselves to me and I loved every minute spent with them. It was a whole lot of adventure and fun, but also with some tender and heart-wrenching tear-jerker moments. 

Fave Fantasy

Every Heart a Doorway by Seanan McGuire

Ooh, this was an unexpected fave. It's deliciously original, with such an intriguing premise (children tumbling into other worlds, and then being returned and rejected), a boarding school setting and some  startling sinister activity. Once I got into this, I couldn't out it down and only wished it went for longer. 

The Bird and the Sword by Amy Harmon

This fantasy novel just hit the sweet spot, it was perfectly timed to my reading mood and I loved the magic and world building. It also had a sloooow burn romance featuring a forced marriage (I love when that premise is done well). I devoured The Bird and The Sword in less than a day ~ another reading memory highlight of 2017.

Strange the Dreamer by Laini Taylor

Such a strange and epic fantasy unlike any I have read. The world in Strange the Dreamer came to life for me and was not unlike being inside a vivid dream. It had a slowish start but I knew it would pay off and it definitely did. What a gorgeous and vibrant and harsh and beautiful and devastating experience reading this book was! The imagination of Laini Taylor astounds me.

White Cat by Holly Black

Creative and clever and funny with a tightly plotted mystery and some great twists and reveals. I had seen this series around for a while but thought it didn't look like my thing - so glad I gave it a go as I binge read all three books and found them so satisfying and fun. New Holly Black fangirl!

Fave Adult Fiction

My Not So Perfect Life by Sophie Kinsella

My Not So Perfect life is predictable chick lit. But it was also so happy-making! I loved the charm of this book, and spent a smiley afternoon delighting in this book. It's books like this which bring some added sunshine to my reading life - and I am always on the lookout for that. Can't wait for the next Sophie Kinsella. 

Notable mentions

I read 135 books - rating over 60 of them 4 stars or higher. So it's hard for me to just mention the ones above. I've tried to just stick to ones that made a lasting impression and I really loved reading, so I'm giving a shout-out to the ones below as I 100% recommend all of them!

Five contemporary YA's (and one fantasy/fairytale retelling)

Four series I very much enjoyed

Three New Adult Books I loved

Two historicals that stayed with me

Six Adult Fiction titles I loved

Have you read and loved any of my 2017 faves?

I would love to hear a few of your faves so leave me a comment and I'll add them to my 2018 TBR :)

Curious about my faves in previous years? Here's links to my other posts (I'm thinking of doing a very delayed faves of 2016 post which I missed last year):

2015  Top Twenty Reads

2014 Part One  Part Two  Top Ten2013 Top Ten2012 Top Ten2011 Part One (the books) Part Two (characters) Part Three (scenes) Part Four (faves)
2010 Faves  and Aussie YA faves

Well, That Was Awkward by Rachel Vail ~ Review

Gracie has never felt like this before. One day, she suddenly can't breathe, can't walk, can't anything and the reason is standing right there in front of her, all tall and weirdly good-looking: A.J. 

It turns out A.J. likes not Gracie but Gracie's beautiful best friend, Sienna. Obviously Gracie is happy for Sienna. Super happy! She helps Sienna compose the best texts, responding to A.J. s surprisingly funny and appealing texts, just as if she were Sienna. Because Gracie is fine. Always! She's had lots of practice being the sidekick, second-best. 

It s all good. Well, almost all. She's trying.

Well, That Was Awesome!

Hello, new favourite book :)

Well, That Was Awkward is one brilliantly funny, very clever, unputdownable, grin-worthy absolute blast of a book. Oh my gosh, I loved it so. 

Well, That Was Awkward is a charming loose retelling of Cyrano de Bergerac ~ always a fun premise to remake for teens of today ~ who are texting and emoji-ing all over the place. It's a real feel-good story with delicious puns, quick witted humour, a tortoise (and a rabbit), a suddenly cute boy, best friends, epic inside jokes (Never. Gonna. Happen.), and the perfect amount of depth to flesh out all the characters. The characters are in grade 8 and they are perfectly awesome.  Oh, and the parents were also complete classics! I love when parents are just as funny and original as the teen characters (shout out to all you awesome parents out there! Haha). 

True to the title, there were many hilariously awkward moments, so this should be your next read when you're in the mood for some LOLs (haha). I seriously loved this ~ it's a perfect blend of some of my fave things in fiction: light-hearted fun with the perfect amount of angst, awkward shenanigans, characters who are my people, and a plot which builds in anticipation to a sweet. sweet climax and charming and cool resolution. 

Note: this is a perfect one for all the MG readers out there, as well as YA readers - and adults who love to smile and reminisce about those awkward early teen years, haha. 

Well, That Was Awkward @ goodreads

July Favourites

I love July with it's 2 weeks of awesome winter holidays (which is not so winter-y on the Sunny Coast ~ an average of 24C/75F during the day). I also love how July is like a mid-year reflection period and a new start to the second half of the year. I have so many books I'm looking to reading in the rest of 2017 and still so many on my TBR I have not gotten to yet... Having said, that, I've read 87 book so far in 2017, and 20 of them I've marked as new faves (I'm so happy with nearly a 1/4 of my reads being perfectly matched to my reading tastes and moods)

July was an awesome reading month. I:

• discovered 2 new fun authors to follow (Ingrid Paulsen and Lia Weston)
• read new books from 3 fave authors (Kasie West, Lucy Clarke, Mhairi McFarlane)
• read a long-standing TBR backlist title (a classic Meg Cabot! ~ The Guy next Door)
• reread an old fave (P.S I Like You ~ on a glorious Saturday sleepy lie in bed morning)
• listened to a fave book in audio format <3 (The Piper's Son!)

July Book Total

Books: 11
Audiobooks: 1 

Adult fiction: 7
Young Adult fiction: 4
Australian fiction: 2
Rereads: 2

Fave Young Adult Read

Ingrid Paulson's debut Why I Loathe Sterling Lane was totally fun and full of things made of win:

• boarding school and pranks
• genuine loathing with barbed and witty banter and revengeful scheming
• Veronica Mars-style sleuthing
• steamy, swoony pay-off

My review elaborates on why I loved this book and I am so hoping more people find and fall in love with it too <3

Fave Adult Read(s)

Australian author Lia Weston's Those Pleasant Girls is a cool, ridiculously smiley, seriously funny, awesome read with a wild sense of humour and just the right touch of whimsy. I really loved this and you can read my full review here (with bonus mentions of The Gilmore Girls, Jaclyn Moriarty and Anne of Green Gables).

I love Mhairi McFarlane so much (her books have such a brilliant, funny UK vibe, with characters I genuinely care for). My two fave books of hers are You Had Me At Hello and Who's That Girl ~ so I was ridiculously thrilled to see Mhairi released a novella sequel to You Had Me at Hello (I've read YHMAT three times, I love it so). After Hello was pretty much perfect and I grinned my way through it ~ so happy to be back with Rachel and Ben (BEN!!!) and the gang. Mhairi's books bring a whole heap of addictive light and life and smiles into my life <3

Fave audiobook

Being back with Tom and Georgie and the gang was just perfect. I didn't even realise how much I missed them until I was listening. The audiobook was a really compelling format and my work commute was a definite highlight of my day for the week I spent listening to this. 

Fave reread

Oh, mate, some of the tropes in this book are my personal kryptonite: the whole secret identity/letter writing thing (which never gets old to me) and also a good old fashioned hate-to-love antagonistic romance. Even on the reread (when I knew where things were going) I struggled to put it down. I love this brand of cute, funny and smiley contemporary YA. I think this book is up there as one of my fave Kasie West titles ~ along with The Distance Between Us.

So there's my happy-making faves of July titles

What about you? What's one book you've read recently and fallen in love with?

Letters to the Lost by Brigid Kemmerer

Juliet Young always writes letters to her mother, a world-traveling photojournalist. Even after her mother's death, she leaves letters at her grave. It's the only way Juliet can cope. 

Declan Murphy isn't the sort of guy you want to cross. In the midst of his court-ordered community service at the local cemetery, he's trying to escape the demons of his past. 

When Declan reads a haunting letter left beside a grave, he can't resist writing back. Soon, he's opening up to a perfect stranger, and their connection is immediate. But neither Declan nor Juliet knows that they're not actually strangers. When life at school interferes with their secret life of letters, sparks will fly as Juliet and Declan discover truths that might tear them apart.

What an absolute riveting gem of a novel. I expected to enjoy this but had no idea how much this book would affect me. Four things I loved:

Surprises - The plot did not follow a typical path. It felt like the characters really drove the plot forward with their decisions creating an organic reading experience (rather than one that followed typical beats for the premise.

Deep bellyaches ~ This happened to me. Those sharp intense stomach pangs when you suddenly feel the characters pain and see their hopes dashed and have your heart in your mouth just knowing there is more pain ahead before they can find their way out.  The whole wanting to reach into the book and hold them tight <3

I love how the author managed to peel away layers on all of her characters so we see them so differently to how people may automatically perceive them. The characters were all beautifully flawed and wonderfully diverse.

Also, can I just say how much I *love* the secret-identity-letter-writing motif? I've read a few books recently with variations on this and it's fast becoming and fave trope (bring on more, please). So much suspense and mystery and anticipation of either the reveal/the characters realising the identity. In Letters to the Lost this was done so well I seriously felt like I could barely out the book down because I had to see how it would all unfold.  

I cannot recommend this enough. Another fave read of the year for me :)


Letters to the Lost @ goodreads

June Favourites

June has meant glorious summer-like days on the Sunny Coast with just a smidgen of a winter-y vibe in the evenings. Beautiful reading weather although I hope July brings some real snuggle up under the covers and read weather. I had a fab read count in June with two new fave books and a reread which I loved more than the original time I read it (it was perfectly timed and deliciously addictive).

June book total: 17
Books: 14
Audiobooks: 3

Adult fiction: 7
Young Adult fiction: 10
Australian fiction: 3
Rereads: 1

Fave young adult read

If I Fix You by Abigail Johnson

If I Fix You totally took me by surprise (both with how much I ended up liking it and in the direction the story took). It felt messy and real and I couldn't put it down. Really excited for Abigail Johnson's sophomore novel The First To Know which is out November of this year.

Fave adult fiction

Dinner at Roses by Danielle Hawkins

So, so good! I love Hawkins's effortless style that makes me feel like I am a part of the (fictional) family. Hawkin's dialogue is so superb, and her comedic timing lifts the book in places where there is sorrow and loss. The relationships and interactions are genuine and nuanced and the romance is all the more swoony for it's understated slow build and reveal. Love the New Zealand setting and I am so happy to have a new fave contemporary adult author to follow.

Seriously ~ if you like contemporary adult fiction with small town settings, a bit of swoon, a lot of heart, effortless humour and unforgettable characters you need to be looking up Danielle Hawkins ASAP.  

Fave reread

I've Got Your Number by Sophie Kinsella

Perfectly delightful: funny, slightly ridiculous, swoony, feel-good fun. With the most smilingest of footnotes. LOVED.

What's your recent most fave read? 

Hope all is well in your world :)

xo Nomes

May favourites

My reading in May began beautifully with three back to back really good reads. Three in a row is a rare occurrence for me and I loved that buzzy feeling I got from having just read a great book times three. It reminded me of how awesome books can be and how having a great book currently waiting on my bedside table makes everything in life seem brighter. That sweet anticipation of getting home and getting back into my newest favourite literary world =  <3

The rest of May evened out into a few hit and misses and finally getting to some titles that had been wallowing on my TBR for way too long. At this point I am also impressed by my commitment to the whole audio book thing! Until this year, I'd only listened to a handful of audiobooks by myself (but having enjoyed heaps of middle grade audiobooks on car trips with the family). I have been finding time for audiobooks while walking my dog, doing dinner prep and solo driving about doing errands. It's a really easy way for me to sample books that are on my TBR as well - I've listened to heaps of openers and gotten a few chapters in to a few books before deciding to move on to something different.


May book total: 15
Books: 11 (including 1 reread)
Audiobooks: 4

Fave reads of May

Stargazing for Beginners by Jenny McLachlan (My review)

This upbeat, warm and fierce novel is one of my most fave reads of this year! Add this contemporary YA to your TBR if you're looking for a breezy, charming read with a smart lead character. Swoony, fun and a little bit quirky ~ I found the whole novel to be so charming and completely refreshing and addictive reading experience. 

Letters to the Lost by Brigid Kemmerer
I had no idea I would love this book so! It's definitely different to my usual YA read (with kind of moody characters and darker themes) but everything was just handled to beautifully and honestly. It's a completely compelling, additive and affecting novel - all the love and lots of hugs for these characters. Review to come!


Fave audiobooks

White Cat by Holly Black

This was so good! Creative and clever and funny with a tightly plotted mystery and some great twists and reveals. Cassel is such a likeable narrator ~ Black does a great job of making this con artist with a conscience likeable and so easy to root for. The Curse Workers world feels fresh and original and I'm so happy to have a new YA series to get into. I've already got my 16 year old son started on this. Why did I take so long to get on board with this?

This whole series is narrated by Jesse Eisenberg and he does such an outstanding job as a voice narrator.  Def recommend checking out the audio of this. Plus its very un-intimidating at a very doable 6 hours 40 minutes. It had me smiling from the first chapter. What do you think of the different covers?

Massive thanks to Trish (from Trish Talks Texts) for recommending this to me as one of her fave male YA POV series. 

When You Reach Me by Rebecca Stead
The audio version of this book was really engaging and conversational. Charming and clever with a cast of characters who are a little eccentric but feel completely real. It also has a beautiful kind of sad and wistful ending. A super-quick listen which had me thinking back on all the clues planted throughout once the reveal took place and the mystery was being solved. And the naked guy (after the reveal!)! Haha! My daughter and I had a good laugh about that :)

Other recommendations

Hunted by Meagan Spooner

A very compelling and original Beauty and the Beast fantasy retelling which was a totally immersive reading experience for me.

Fave things: 

• the characters (just gorgeous narration and fully fleshed characters everywhere - all with unique characteristics and strengths and struggles)
• the setting (the winter and the woods and the cottage and the castle vibrantly came to life) 
• family love (the fatherly and sisterly bonds just sang from the pages) 
• the mystery of it all (why? How? What is going to happen?) 
• plus discovering and being surprised with the unique twists and angles in revisiting this familiar story

Smidgen disappointed because: I wanted a bit more of the romance and swoon between this Beauty and her beast. But that was not the books focus ~ it was more focused on Beauty's own journey, and the character struggles of the Beast ~ their restlessness and striving to find their place in the world (and Spooner did an outstanding job of exploring this). In the end, their inner struggles, desires and outlook on life made them kindred spirits (in some ways a stronger bond than a more romantic love). I think I may have loved this more if I known beforehand it was not romance focused (so my reading experience would not be clouded by those swoony hopes! haha). Hunted still strongly resonated with me and I'm really keen for more from Meagan Spooner.

Interference by Kay Honeyman
Review to come of this Jane Austin retelling. Lots to love here! Especially if you like football, small town politics and cute boys!

Whoo! Awesome reading month and I'm really keen for the books next up on my TBR which include:

Have you read any of my fave reads of May? 

Or any from my June TBR list? 

What was the best book you read in May?